The Fraser is opening in time for the long weekend which is good news.  Remember when reading the following that there is a maximum of 4 salmon per licence per day.  So if you catch 4 pinks, that's it for the day.  Other than that, head out there and have fun.

Effective one hour before sunrise Monday, August 3 until one hour after sunset Monday, August 31, 2015, the daily limit for chinook salmon is four (4) with only one(1) greater than 50 cm. 

 Effective one hour before sunrise Monday, August 3 until one hour after sunset Thursday, December 31, 2015 the daily limit for pink salmon is four (4). 

Effective one hour before sunrise Monday, August 3 until one hour after sunset Thursday, December 31, 2015 the daily limit for chum salmon is two (2).

 There is no retention of sockeye salmon permitted at this time. Given the low abundance of sockeye and the expected en-route mortality, impacts on sockeye are to be minimized and DFO is working with all users of the resource to limit impacts on sockeye. While fishing for pink, chinook and chum salmon, anglers should avoid using fishing methods that catch sockeye salmon and fish selectively. The first principle of selective harvesting is to avoid catching non-targeted stocks. This means that anglers should use methods that do not catch sockeye. The following fishing methods enable anglers to catch pink, chinook and chum salmon and rarely intercept sockeye salmon:

Salmon fishing is good if you go to the right places (stating the obvious)

First, where you can't go.

The Fraser Chinook fishery from Mission Bridge upstream to the Alexandria Bridge is currently scheduled to open August 3rd.  We'll see how that goes.

The early Stewart Sockeye are in the Fraser but the sockeye fishery remains closed and I unfortunately am not holding my breath but will rather wait and see if it will open in mid August once some fish have made it up the river and survived the high temperatures.

The estimated escapement of Early Stuart sockeye as of July 23rd is 29,600 fish.


The estimated escapement of Early Summer-run sockeye past Mission through July 23rd is 53,300 fish.


So for sockeye, you have to head over to Port Alberni and partake in that run which has had reports of decent catches.

As far as pinks goes, local fishing in Howe Sound picked up over the weekend and should continue as the Squamish, Mamquam and Cheakamus rivers begin to fill up......Tight lines!

Today was a pretty good day to be on the water in spite of the heavy rain and gloomy skies which I was betting on wouldn't last and they didn't.  I had heard that the pinks had arrived in Howe Sound and I decided to head out and see how true the rumor was.  I arrived at the Mamquam parking lot and was optimistic before I even got out of the truck as there were several people already heading home with fish shaped bulges in their plastic bags.  So I geared up and headed across the bridge.  The Mamquam was the lowest I have seen it even after this weeks rains.  It was down to a single channel rather than the normal three at this time of year.  There were fisherman at the railway bridge pool which is the upper most portion of the river which is open to fishing.  As I followed the stream down to the confluence with the Squamish the number of fishers increased dramatically.  The tell tale signs of fish heads and fish on stringers indicate that the morning had been productive for some.  The most productive was right at the confluence and was pretty crowded.

While I wasn't thinking of spring salmon, the sight of a "slightly expired spring" opened up the possibility that today's menu could be more than just pinks and perhaps the odd bull trout.

After rubbing elbows with a few fisherman, I moved downstream to hopefully meet the fish as the tide backed up the river.

The most successful fisher of the day was a great blue heron that kept parking itself between us lacky fisherman to show us how it was done!

The fisher that stole the show for the day was a little merganser duckling.  Him and his pals were feverishly chasing something in the shallows while mom dove nearby but when it was time to move on he hopped onto mom's back and hogged all the room.  So while he got a free ride to new feeding grounds and catching a quick nap on the way, his brothers and sisters had to swim upstream the hard way!.....some fisherman know how to do it!

So, since the birds were doing better than most fisherman, I decided to head back and stopped in at Britannia Beach for a quick look.  To my good fortune there were literally hundreds of pinks rolling about 100 feet off shore and there were fisherman casting out to them.

So now that I was officially off the clock, I headed down the bank and tossed a few.  There were several runs that came in closer to shore and a few of us fly fishers were rewarded.

So, all in all another pretty tough summer day here on the west coast of British Columbia.  As I sit and type this (about 2 hours after these last photos were taken) I can hear the sizzle of the barbecue and smell the fabulous spices on my fresh salmon.....gotta stop writing now....the Corona has been cooled to where it is just starting to form ice crystals and dinner is served! 

Some days when the weather is hot and the fishing is slow you can do other things around here like hike up into the kazillions of mountain peaks and alpine valleys.  Today I asked my brother-in-law and kamikazi mountain guide Harold to take me for a stroll up the Zopkios Ridge northwest of the Coquihalla Highway.  Our path starts at the rest stop just uphill from the snowsheds and quickly changes 3,000 feet in elevation to get to the first peak which is Zopkios Peak.

Our goal was to hike as far along the ridge as my weak knees and not so acclimatized leg muscles would allow us.  It took us about two hours at 1/2 Harolds regular pace (something about gravity works twice as hard on me as it does on him) to make the top of the first ridge at Zopkios Peak.

Once we made it to the ridge it was comments like, "common you slacker, pull up yer britches and stop crying like a baby!" from Harold that inspired me to soldier on.

Harold laid out the peaks which we hoped to conquer one after the other, while he was confident, I was hoping I had packed enough Gator Aid!

The granite faces were quite spactular and when you were standing on the top edge looking down it was a way's down!

In some locations, the granite looked like it had been chiseled out in a quarry to make giant pillars or even stairs!

After about 9 km of hiking it was obvious that the high altitude, low oxygen levels (and my constant whining) was wearing Harold out, so we just stopped and took in the views.

With my vast knowledge of Mountainology I explained many of the mountain wonders to Harold.

For some reason, Harold could only take so much education in one day and decided to abandon me and find another way down the mountain.

At the end of a long day we stopped literally at one of Harold's favorite watering holes.  After 18 km and 6,000 feet of total elevation change it was a nice way to cool down!  Thanks Harold for being such a great mountain guide........foot note: if you stay submerged too long in this water in can result in severe shrinkage of certain parts of your anatomy!

2015-07-07  Fraser River White sturgeon Society releases a new Video on how to properly handle white sturgeon.  Click Here to See it.  This is a comprehensive video that I highly recommend you  watch so we can preserve these magnificent fish.  This is especially important this year with the high water temperatures and low water levels where the fish can become easily stressed.  Take a look at the Video and Learn to protect the resource